By: William Martinez ……..
The Dybbuk Box is a small wine cabinet that gained infamy after being sold on eBay with a detailed, supernatural backstory. It is widely considered an internet urban legend and was the inspiration for the 2012 horror film The Possession.
The Story and “History” of the Dybbuk Box
- Origin Story: The legend of the Dybbuk Box began in 2003 when a man named Kevin Mannis, a writer and furniture refinisher, purchased an antique wine cabinet from an estate sale in Portland, Oregon. According to Mannis’s subsequent eBay listing, the box had belonged to a 103-year-old Holocaust survivor from Poland who had sealed it because it contained a “dybbuk”—a malicious, disembodied spirit from Jewish mythology. The woman’s family insisted the box was never to be opened.
- The “Curse”: Mannis’s eBay description claimed that after he opened the box, he and others who came into contact with it experienced a series of frightening and negative events. The alleged phenomena included nightmares of an old hag, a “tidal wave of bad luck,” the sudden onset of health problems, and the smell of jasmine and cat urine. Mannis stated that he had to get rid of the box because of the misfortunes it brought.
- Subsequent Owners: After Mannis, the box passed through a few different hands, with each new owner adding to the lore. The box’s most notable owner was Jason Haxton, the Director of the Museum of Osteopathic Medicine. Haxton created a website and wrote a book about his experiences, further solidifying the box’s status as a paranormal legend. He eventually gave the box to paranormal investigator Zak Bagans for his museum.
- The Contents: According to Mannis, the box contained two pennies from the 1920s, two locks of hair, a dried rosebud, a small granite statue, a wine goblet, and a single candle holder.
The Reality Behind the Legend
In 2021, Kevin Mannis, the original creator of the story, admitted that he fabricated the entire legend. He stated that he is a “creative writer” and that the Dybbuk Box story was a fictional narrative he created to sell the item on eBay. Mannis’s admission confirmed what many skeptics had long suspected. An investigation by a paranormal researcher also concluded that the box was not a Jewish wine cabinet from Spain, but an incomplete minibar from New York, a Karoff Originals “Liquor Bar Cabinet Structure” from the 1950s.
Despite the creator’s confession, the Dybbuk Box continues to be a popular subject in paranormal culture and is often presented as a genuine haunted object.
The Film Adaptation: The Possession (2012)
The legend of the Dybbuk Box served as the basis for the 2012 horror film The Possession. The movie follows a young girl who buys an antique box at a yard sale, unknowingly releasing a malevolent dybbuk that begins to possess her. The film deviates from the eBay story and creates its own narrative, but the core concept of a cursed box containing a dybbuk remains. The producers and actors of the film expressed their reluctance to be around the real box, adding to its mystique.
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